Friday Favorites

Happy Friday! I hope you are all ready for a long and fun weekend ahead!

I haven’t ever done a “Friday Favorites,” but I have seen them popping up on other blogs lately. I find them interesting and fun to see what others “faves” are and it gives me some new products or things to try out. So I figured I’d throw one in every now and then!

Here we GO!

1. UTAH FOOTBALL!

Last night was the first Utah Game of the Season and I married a die hard and became quite the fan myself through marriage. My father in law has season tickets and is kind enough to invite us to a few games throughout the year. Yesterday was the perfect night for a game and we walked away with smiles on our face due to the big WIN.

2. Blackberry Mojito Tea from Starbucks BLENDED!

Getting my go to tea at Starbucks this week has now changed forever! I loved it blended and will most likely never go back.

3. Moroccan Oil

This is the oil I have been using on my mop for the couple years after a friend of mine introduced it to me. I have very frizzy and dry hair and this helps it so much. I can’t do my hair without it anymore.

4. Maybelline Tinted chapstick.

I recently bought this on a whim at the grocery store and love it! It has a sheer color to it and is moisturizing. I’m in love with it!

5. Jenna Hipp Nail Polish

I found this Jenna Hipp on sale on at Costco a few weeks ago and have used it a few times and I love the bright colors and I don’t have to do multiple coats with it and it last about a week before it chipped!

8. Super BB by Physician Formula.

I used to be a “MAC” only kind of girl, but when they changed their studio fix base my skin kind of hated it. I snagged this at the grocery store just to try, and it ended up being awesome! It seems to conceal and blend perfectly with my skin and now I have bought it at least 3 times since I first purchased it. If you need a new base I would recommend this!

Do you have a product or something you have been loving lately?

Fitness Questions

 

Happy Tuesday!

This morning I am going to answer a few fitness questions that I have received lately.

• What is your fitness routine like?

My fitness routine being pregnant is pretty much the same just minus a lot of running. I am a coach at GPP fitness and I do that workout Monday-Friday with only having to make a few modifications for the bump. I also am a Body Pump and Body Attack Instructor. Depending on the week, I will teach Body Attack on Mondays, and Body Pump Tuesday and Saturday. I did a post on modifying Body Pump while pregnant not to long ago. I also teach Boot camp 2-3 times a week. Monday, Tuesday and every other Thursday, but usually do not do the workout with the class. More of a show and tell then do kind of class.

My fitness routine changes and isn’t really a set day to day kind of thing. I train multiple muscle groups focusing on more circuit/cardio style workouts depending on the day.  At GPP we mix in a lot of strength training and I enjoy that as well. I love certain olympic  lifts and can’t wait to focus on them a little more after baby. I love the variety of what I do because it is always changing and it me active throughout the week.

• How many days a week and for how long do you workout?

I workout 6 days a week and the time depend son the day. Most GPP workouts last about 30 minutes, and if I teach body pump/attack those are 60 minute classes. If I am training for a race I will run/bike/swim depending on what I am training for. Typically it is about an hour and half a day, but lately its been a lot less.

• Do you always feel like working out? How do you find the motivation to workout everyday?

Of course I have days that I would rather just skip my workout because I’m either not feeling up to it or  I want to sleep an extra hour in the morning because my kids are sleeping in too. Especially, while pregnant, but because I work in the gym, once I get there and see everyone else sweating it out. It kicks me into gear and I know I will feel better after I do it too. No matter how  long it takes me, I tell myself I can go as slow as I want but make a promise to myself that I will finish the whole thing. Half way through I get a surge of energy that drives me through it. 

• Have you ever been injured from your workouts and how did you deal with it?

Yes! I love to run, but my body always tends to fall into an injury once I hit a certain mileage. I have had a quad injury but the most recent was plantar fascitis. I had to take time off of running, jumping etc. I would keep my cardio up by swimming or cycling. I ran a marathon with plantar fascitits which probably wasn’t the smartest thing but after that I took a good 3 months off of running. I would keep doing any exercise that didn’t hurt. I missed running a lot during that time but I think you become a stronger runner mentally through recovery.

• I really want to run a marathon one day, but have never run a race and don’t know where to start. Do you have any tips?

Get out and run! You become a better runner by running. It doesn’t matter how slow you are in the beginning, as long as you keep it up you will get better and start to enjoy it more and more.  Having a friend to go with helps too! Sign up for a race, that way you have something to prepare for.

I am not a naturally fast runner and to be honest I hated running up until I graduated from high school and actually turned to running to cope with the death of my mom. After awhile, I signed up for my first half marathon with a friend. We trained and ran side by side for months before the race. It was finishing that first race that gave me that fire to sign up for another. 

• It is hard for me to find time to workout with my kids. How do you do it?

I totally get that! Especially when they are young. I usually coach early in the morning so my goal is to get my workout done before I go home. Many gyms have a daycare you can pay for or it may be included in your pass. If you can’t make it to the gym and prefer to workout at home, still strive to get it done early in the morning or after the kids go to bed so you won’t have many distractions. I have a few home workouts posted in the “work it out” tab.

Your turn!

Pick one of the questions above and answer it!

Back to School Sweat & A Few Nursery Details

Today was the first day of school for a lot of kids around here. Tanner and Baylee still have a whole week before they head back to their 2nd year of preschool.

I had a packed Boot camp class which is always a plus of the kids back in school! I put them through a quick warm up, shoulder shaper and had them hit this part of the workout.

Afterward I spent 45 minutes on a spin bike for my workout of the day. I would do heavy resistance for 3 minutes out of the saddle followed by 1 minute sprint with lower resistance. I got nice and sweaty. I have NEVER taken a spin class before and I grabbed a schedule on my way out the door and plan on doing one this week hopefully!

The Weekend

I’m going to back up a bit.

This weekend we finally started on this babes nursery! With 6 weeks left and 2 of those weeks Brent will be gone I figured we better get on it.

Because we don’t know the gender of this baby, this nursery has a very neutral look to it. I absolutely love the look of a classy yet clean look lately anyway which has made the planning of this nursery pretty easy sailing.

Brent painted creamy white stripes on the nursery, just on one wall. The other walls are just that tan color.

 

I had just gotten home from teaching Body Pump so excuse the hot mess up there.

I ordered quite a few pieces for the nursery too.

Including this white fur pillow and this pillow with a yellow bird off of Etsy out of the VFillustration store

*Pictures are from the actual etsy page.

This Dresser from Wayfair.com

Image source

I also ordered some white picture frames and spice racks (for bookshelves) from Ikea.

I can’t wait till it all gets here so I can put it all together.

Saturday night we got a sitter and headed out for dinner and movie kind of date night. I got a gift card to a movie theater for my birthday so it was time to cash it in.

Date nights come maaaaybe once every two months or so around here. It is refreshing and much needed to have a night out with Brent.

We headed out without any real plans for dinner and figured we would find a restaurant by the movie theater, but when we arrived most had over an hour wait. We were both starving and bagged the whole restaurant thing and headed to Kneaders. In 15 minutes we had our food in front of us.

I ordered the chicken citrus salad with a side of 12 grain bread, and Brent got the turkey cranberry sandwich with broccoli cheese soup.

The weather was absolutely perfect so we enjoyed our meal outside on the patio of Kneaders.

When we headed to the movie theater, the movie we had planned on seeing was sold out so we opted to see “Into the Storm.” 

This theater is pretty cool because all of the seats are full on recliners. For this pregnant momma I was in heaven. (Until it swallowed my phone and took 30 minutes to find after the movie..)

The movie was okay. Kind of what you would expect from any other tornado movie. I probably wouldn’t see it again, but it wasn’t bad.

Tell me something about your weekend?

Spin Class? Yay or Nay?

Link Lovin’

Happy Friday!

Yesterday, we had a full day of fun. Which included a trip to the zoo with some friends. Tanner and Baylee love the zoo and yesterday was the first time I could actually get them to pose for the camera while we were there!

We even visited a pretty fun Candy store yesterday while we were out shopping that evening. It was so cute and had a lot of fun candy. I let the kids each pick out a few pieces of candy for the road home for being such good shopping buddies. (Bribery at its finest.)

Today I just wanted to pop in and share a few other post that I have read this week that stood out to me. As a blogger I swing by quite a few blogs, and thought why not give certain post from my blogger friends and other sites that deserve a little more attention.

Blogging takes a lot of time and dedication. Not to mention a bit of creativity to post regulary.

So here were a few of my faves throughout the week.

Recipes:

Summer Drink Series by Kait @Chickadee Says

Breakfast Almond Plum Cake by Katie @yes, I want cake.

Cocoa Cherry Pistachio Bites by Lindsay @cotter crunch

Crunchy Chocolate Chip Cookie Protein Balls by LIndsay @Lindsays List

Double Chocolate Frozen Banana Soft Serve by Amanda @semi-health nut

Blogger Help:

How to grow your blog and make money by Julie @Pbfingers.

Health:

Stopped Chewing Gum by Gina @ The Fitnessista

When to lower your standards by Brittany @ Delights and Delectables

Fitness:

9 things you didn’t know about your glutes @fit sugar

Taper Nutrition @Ironman.com

5 ways a fit by Erika @ the sweet life

Coconut Chia Granola

The other day it was pretty rainy day, which was perfect for baking some granola.

I pulled the one almond butter out of my pantry that wasn’t on the recall list.

Coconut Chia Granola

Ingredients:

• 2 Cups Quaker Rolled Oats
• 1/4 heaping cup MaraNatha Coconut almond butter
• 1/4 C. Chia seeds
• 1/4 C. Agave nectar
• 1/4 C. Slivered almonds
• 1/4 C.Bobs Red Mill Shredded Coconut (unsweetened)

Directions:

Preheat oven to 350 degrees

Combine all ingredients into one bowl.

Mix well.

 

Take a picture of your daughters oatmeal, because she asked you too.

Spread oats out onto greased cookie cookie sheet. (I use coconut oil from TJ’s.)

Bake for 15 minutes tossing every 5 minutes or so.

You might forget and burn it a little and that’s okay..

It is still delicious.

Baby Book Gift Idea

Today was one of those days that I had a whole “to do” list and maaaaaaybe got 10% done. Days like that just happen, and I’m sure tomorrow will be another one. I am feeling a bit more tired at this point in my pregnancy. It is like my first trimester all over again. Nap>to do list.

I am actually quite productive in the morning. The fatigue doesn’t hit me until about 3 or 4 in the afternoon..

In the morning I get my workout done first thing, or second.. depending on what classes I coach that day. Today I headed in early and got this one done at GPP.

I RX’d all the weights but subbed a 400m row for the jump ropes. 1500 jump ropes + the bump isn’t the best combination now a days.

I headed to Costco after work to pick up necessities like spinach and raspberries. Their Driscoll raspberries are large and quite close to perfection. They also went up about a $1.50. Boo… but they are kind of like gasoline to the car, in the fact that you NEEEEED them. So I bought really expensive delicious raspberries. 

Yesterday, I snagged a bag of Terra Sweet Potato Chips on a whim at the grocery store. I had these at Red Rock Relay in March and welcomed them back into my lunch life.

For lunch I made a turkey wrap with a side of chips and raspberries. It was a fast lunch but hey, it actually made it onto a plate today, which usually doesn’t happen much.

I have turned into the mom who just stands and eats as she makes everybody else’s lunch. Because 1. I’m starving by lunch and am not patient enough to eat off a plate and neither can my kids. 2. As soon as I sit down all of a sudden my food looks better then the kids food (p.s it is the same food) And they want bites of mine or just climb up on my lap or something of the other. Soooo standing is just easier sometimes.

The afternoon was spent playing with a couple neighbor friends at our house and preparing dinner to take to my sister. I made her baked honey mustard chicken, sweet potatoes and steamed broccoli. Healthy and easy!

Tanner and Baylee got to meet their cousin for the first time. They are so in love with him just as much as I am. It was so cute to see them with a newborn. It made me really excited for our sweet babe to get here! In just 7 more weeks!!

They are going to be such good siblings to our babe.

My gift to my new nephew (Dyson) was a scrapbook! I spent a lot of time putting this together. It is one thing that I wish I would have had for T & B. It is just a blank book but I included things like 1st ultrasound, gender reveal, space to put belly pics, labor and delivery, first doctor visit, first hair cut, Month 1-12, etc. That way my sister can just cut and paste the pictures in. I felt a little overwhelmed (that is an understatement) when I  had T & B. I would of loved something to easily document their life that wasn’t over FB or Insta. But life got ahead of me to fast and now they are four.. so I’m hoping this comes in handy to my sister through Dyson’s first year of life.

If you have someone close to you who is about to have a babe and you need a gift idea, give this a go! It has meaning and value that hopefully will be a hit.

Do you put the price of your favorite grocery items into thought before purchasing?

Moms: What is one baby gift you are so glad you received that you didn’t really even think about?

To the end.. or not.

 

Yesterday was an early wake up call.. after just a couple hours of sleep I was up and out the door and headed to work. I strangely wasn’t too tired and was able to get my own workout in.

The GPP workout had running and squats in it and I think I have hit that point in pregnancy that running just doesn’t feel to great “down there”.. or squat… ha! I ran the first two stretches but decided to bike with heavy resistance in place of the 800m run. I thought maybe I could be one of those pregnant chicks that runs until the day I give birth but yesterday proved to possibly be my last for awhile.

I headed home and made a quick berry shake to take on the go.

 

I had to run a few errands around town and took the kiddos to a friends house so Brent and I could go visit my sister and her new babe in the hospital.

After our visit snuggling that little man Brent and I headed out to lunch.

We stopped by a costa vida on our way home, I think I may be a fan of costa vida over café rio!

I had the grilled chicken small salad which was just perfect. I even got extra chicken just because.

When we all got home we spent time going through pics of my sisters baby with Tanner and Baylee since they aren’t allowed to visit at the hospital and Baylee seems to be just a little excited to have a baby of her own around the house..

I love her excitement about how good she thinks she is at being a big sister.

We ended the night with a bike ride with the kids while I walked with my SIL Janey and even got to finally catch up with Janetha a bit!! Her babe is due SO soon and I can’t wait to meet her little man too!

CAFÉ RIO or COSTA VIDA?

Moms: How long did you run for while pregnant?

RX, Remodel, Swim, Reunion, 13, and A BABY!

Phew! What a weekend! I seriously could not come up with a title for this post because it is pretty much all over the place. So I just threw this out there.

Our weekend started with wrapping up the last workout of RX+ week at GPP fitness. I always look forward to this workout because Hooverball is a freaking blast. I obviously couldn’t play this year due to my own little hooverball, and it gets a little intense. I had a great time watching and cheering on members of the gym.

Brent finished the last of our kitchen remodel!

The backsplash.

I was so indecisive about this backsplash and researched and looked at millions online and finally decided on this one from Lowes. I’m in love with it and it feels so good to have my kitchen all back in one piece.

Tanner and Baylee wrapped up swim lessons. I bribed my “cats” that if they didn’t cry on their last day of swim lessons that we would get them a prize. It worked like a charm.. Baylee chose a barbie and Tanner picked out a track for his prize.

Can you tell he is just a little excited about it? This little set up has been up for 4 days now.

Saturday was a packed day, starting with Brent going hunting in the early morning and my regular Saturday Body Pump Class.

At 32 weeks pregnant, I’m finally starting to feel it. Pump was tough to get through, but in the end I was a sweaty mess and didn’t go into labor so I guess that is a win.

After pump I headed out to my Aunts house and we spent the entire afternoon at the pool showing off all the kids “swim tricks” they learned in swim lessons.

T & B did great and swam for HOURS.

Then we headed to a birthday party for my BF’s Sisters Daughter. It was also our 10 year anniversary that night but we ended up just getting together with the two of us and chatting and laughing the whole night and completely missing the reunion..

Ashley has been my best friend since 3rd grade. We literally spent every day together all the way through high school. After high school we kind of floated apart. In the last year or so we see each other more often but still not as often as we like, so it was good to get together that night and hang out like old times. 

Sunday was my youngest brothers birthday. He is now a teenager and major lady killer. Yes?

Happy Birthday to Jamison!

We all hung out for awhile except for my sister Heather who was IN LABOR!

She was in the hospital while the rest of us ate ice cream cake.

Baylee has become quite the baby lover and I can’t help but get excited for her to be a big sister!

At about 11:00PM my sister, Dad, Step-Mom and I headed out to the hospital anxiously waiting for my sisters sweet babe to come! We hung out for about an hour and half before we were allowed to go back and see them. She did a great job and brought the most perfect angel babe to earth. She did skin to skin for an hour and around 2:30 in the morning I finally got to hold him!!

As soon as I took him in my arms my baby in my belly got all active and crazy. Just saying hi to her or his cousin!

We spent the next hour talking and just enjoying the time and moment together. He weighed 7lb 7oz and is 21 inches long.

I can’t get get over his smell and ALL of that HAIR!

Makes me excited to have my own little babe here in just 6 short weeks! AH!

Congrats to Heather and Kyller!

It was an amazing ending to a great weekend!

Tell me something exciting about your weekend?